There were times over the last five years, when Chief Russell Myers Ross wondered whether his dream of creating a solar farm would ever become a reality.

There were studies and more studies, funding applications, community discussions and back and forth talks with BC Hydro and the provincial government. Then there were little hitches, such as deciding on the Riverwest Sawmill site, 80-kilometres west of Williams Lake, and then discovering that one parcel was partially owned by another company.

“We had to find a way to make it 100 per cent our ownership … It took $80,000 to sort of buy them out,” Myers Ross said.

Once construction started, with apprentices from the six Tsilhqot’in communities learning the trade, the weather refused to cooperate, even though the Chilcotin is among B.C.’s top five solar hotspots. Instead of the expected sun, torrential rains brought monsoon conditions to the area in July as construction workers tried to lay cables in muddy trenches.

“You feel like it’s never going to be done,” said Myers Ross, vice-chair of Tsilhqot’in National Government and chief of Yunesit’in First Nation.

The Tsilhqot’in Solar Farm. Photo: EcoSmart

Project granted 25-year power purchase agreement with BC Hydro

Last month the 3,456 panel solar farm held its grand opening and is now waiting for BC Hydro to complete the hookup so power from the sun can flow into the grid. 

The Tsilhqot’in company that oversaw the project, Dandzen Development Corporation, has a 25-year electricity purchase agreement with BC Hydro. 

Susie Rieder, BC Hydro spokesperson said there is not yet a firm date for “completion of the interconnection process.”

The solar farm is one of five shovel-ready projects with “significant Indigenous Nations involvement” approved last year as part of a benefit agreement with BC Hydro. The program was suspended indefinitely when, following approval of the Site C dam on the Peace River, the province ordered BC Hydro to reconsider its power procurement policies.

Myers Ross is happy that the Tsilhqot’in project squeezed in under the wire and, even without the final connection and despite the construction challenges, he is breathing a sigh of relief. 

“This is a really rewarding one for me personally,” he told The Narwhal.

Chief Russell Myers Ross. Photo: Tsilhqot’in National Government / Facebook

“This is the first project to generate our own source of revenue for our Tsilhqot’in organization and the community, which is significant for our overall goal of self-sufficiency,” he said.

The solar farm, with panels lined in 216 sections on a two-hectare site, will provide 1.25 megawatts, creating 1,500 megawatt hours of power annually, which is enough to power about 135 homes.

The project is expected to generate about $175,000 a year in annual revenue.

“It’s not a big moneymaker. It is sort of modest, but it gets us on our way. It’s a big accomplishment and it is one of the first building blocks to getting revenue and being able to use the money where we want to allocate it, with no strings attached,” Myers Ross said.

Project entirely Indigenous owned and operated

The project is the largest solar farm of its kind in B.C. and the only one that is 100 per cent owned and operated by a First Nation.

The final result is “pretty impressive,” said Gabe Pukacz, a Yunesit’in councillor and construction manager for the project.

Specialists and companies familiar with solar installations, such as EcoSmart, were hired to help with technical aspects, but many of the skills were learned by the on-the-ground workers as the job progressed, Pukacz said.

“It was pretty good. The workers made life easy … All my labourers were Tsilhqot’in,” he said.

Now, everyone is waiting for the hookup. Pukacz said.

“It will be interesting to find out what the capabilities of producing power will be during the least efficient sunlight hours in November,” he said.

‘A huge economic win for our nation’

Chief Joe Alphonse, Tsilhqot’in National Government tribal chair, hopes the solar farm inspires other Indigenous communities — in Canada and around the world — to look at clean power opportunities.

“Energy and electricity has been lacking in the territory for a long time, despite one of the longest stretches of hydro in Canada, so we welcome the opportunity for business and to improve the well-being of our people,” Alphonse said in a news release.

Chief Joe Alphonse of the Tl’etinqox Nation stands outside the band office in Anaham, B.C. Photo: Louis Bockner / The Narwhal

In B.C., Indigenous led solar projects include plans by the Upper Nicola Band for a huge solar farm on the Quilchena Reserve and the T’Souke First Nation on Vancouver Island that has been providing solar power to homes on the reserve for more than a decade.

Even with power expected to be generated by Site C, there is increasing evidence that more renewable energy sources will be needed as B.C. makes the transition to clean energy. A University of Victoria study, released this week, found that in order to electrify transportation, which produces one third of the province’s greenhouse gas emissions, the province will need to generate up to 60 per cent more electricity.

In a move in that direction, the provincial government announced this week that, as part of its CleanBC program, $16.5-million will be available to remote, diesel-dependent communities to help with capital costs of renewable electricity projects. Most of the communities eligible to apply for Renewable Energy for Remote Communities funds — which are available through Coast Funds and the Fraser Basin Council — are Indigenous and off-grid.

For the Tsilhqot’in and others living in the surrounding area, the solar farm will beef up the weak 250-kilometre power line that runs from Williams Lake to Tatla Lake, which has prevented some industries from locating to the area and has forced some businesses to partially rely on diesel generators.

Other projects may follow as the Tsilhqot’in Nation Government is currently creating a clean energy plan, looking at the territory and considering what might be available from micro-hydro, geothermal and biomass.

The push for economic independence comes in the wake of the 2014 landmark title case, when the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Tsilhqot’in hold Aboriginal title to about 1,750 square-kilometres of land.

The Tsilhqot’in solar farm on the former site of the Riverwest Sawmill, 80-kilometres west of Williams Lake. Photo: Kai Nagata

Other economic development projects under consideration include boosting tourism in Xeni Gwet’in, a mobile concrete batch plant to help with housing and infrastructure construction and a chip mill.

The need to look for new avenues of revenue that fit with Indigenous culture and traditions has been underlined by the Tsilhqot’in in light of crashing caribou populations, lack of salmon and hunting restrictions on moose following the 2017 wildfires that saw wildlife populations reduced or moving to other areas.

“The solar farm is a huge economic win for our nation,” Alphonse said.

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Federal and provincial climate policies unveiled over the last year are paving the way for Canada to massively increase the amount of energy the country gets from renewable sources, according to a new analysis released today by Clean Energy Canada.

“For the first time the federal government and the provinces are working together to establish a national climate plan,” Dan Woynillowicz, policy director at Clean Energy Canada, said. “A big piece of the puzzle is not just cleaning up the grid, but electrifying other parts of the economy reliant on fossil fuels.”

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government is drafting a ‘pan-Canadian clean growth and climate change framework’ to be released this fall. Meantime, last year Alberta and Saskatchewan, Canada’s main oil and gas producing provinces, set ambitious renewable energy targets. And Ontario recently announced one of the most cutting edge greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction plans in Canada to date.

All of that means things are finally looking up for clean energy in Canada. Federal and provincial politicians now need to make good on their climate pledges for the country to reap even bigger benefits from this $500 billion global industry.

“There’s never been a greater opportunity to move forward on this file for Canada. There is certainly reason for optimism,” Robert Hornung, president of the Canadian Wind Energy Association, told DeSmog Canada.

“We are in a unique moment in time. Not just the federal government, but Ontario, B.C., Quebec, and Alberta have all expressed climate change as a priority,” Hornung said.

Clean Energy Canada says the renewable energy challenge facing Canada right now is different from other heavy greenhouse gas emitting countries like China or the U.S. Nearly 80 per cent of all Canadian electricity comes from non-GHG emitting sources (including nuclear power), three-quarters of which is hydroelectricity.

In the United States, on the other hand, fossil fuels produce close to 70 per cent of the country's electricity.

“We have a comparative advantage in Canada because our grid is already pretty clean,” Woynillowicz told DeSmog. “Canada is in an enviable position.”  

While other countries are focused on switching their electricity base from fossil fuels to clean energy, Canada has a different challenge. Sectors heavily dependent on fossil fuels  — oil and gas, transportation, and industrial processes — have hardly any renewable energy in the mix at the moment.

That means to reduce emissions Canada needs to do things like shift to electric vehicles and efficient electric-based home heating systems (like air and ground source heat pumps).

Has #CleanEnergy's Time Finally Come in #Canada? https://t.co/xncUcQSaPM @standearth @merransmith @SciPolEnv pic.twitter.com/9QMtSvt81X

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) June 16, 2016

“Clean electricity is one of the best tools to fight climate change,” Clean Energy Canada’s executive director Merran Smith told DeSmog Canada. “As we shift to power our economy by clean electricity there will be an increase in demand for electricity and we need that to be clean electricity.”

In B.C., that raises the specter of the controversial Site C dam, but even with an increased demand for electricity in the future (demand in B.C. has been flat for the past 10 years), Site C isn’t necessarily the best solution according to Smith.

“From an economic perspective, Site C is concerning because the cost of renewables like wind and solar power have been dropping dramatically,” she said.

“In the U.S. the price of solar has dropped 80 per cent over last six years and the price of wind has dropped 60 per cent over the last six years. As the cost of those keep going down, that makes them attractive — whereas eight of the last 10 hydro projects built globally have gone over budget.”

A new report released by Bloomberg New Energy Finance this week found that wind and solar will be the cheapest ways of producing electricity in many countries during the 2020s and in most of the world in the 2030s.

“The good news for B.C. is we already have so much large hydro, we really can add intermittent renewables on easily because we already have the large hydro that acts as a battery and acts as storage,” Smith said.

“We could build solar and wind in 100 megawatt units as we need it in rural communities. It could create work around the province. And we could bring it on line as we need it. So a decade from now when we need another 100 MW, it will be even cheaper.”

Woynillowicz sees the emerging national climate framework as the space to address how to power more of the Canadian economy with renewable energy.

“That’s the place to articulate a clear priority of electrification and establish renewable energy targets,” Woynillowicz said. “It will change the conversation around climate away from where jobs are going to be lost to what we are going to create and build.”

Studies have shown the two pillars to decarbonizing any industrialized economy are to first transition completely to non-GHG emitting electrical generation and then run the economy off this clean electricity.

Clean Energy Canada’s analysis highlights energy storage and electricity sharing between provinces as areas where Canada is starting to break ground in electrifying the economy. In regards to the latter, Hornung would like to see more happen politically.

“What the federal government could do is provide a platform for provinces and territories to talk about the shared challenges they face in optimizing their electricity systems and enable collaborative relationships,” Hornung told DeSmog Canada.

Hornung points out more renewable energy is sold to the United States than shared between provinces right now.

Ontario and Quebec, and Alberta and Manitoba have all signed separate memorandums of understanding to take steps toward integrating their electrical grids.

In a report released in February, Clean Energy Canada warned Canada was falling behind its peers on the international stage in terms of renewable energy investments. At the time, it was estimated clean energy investments in Canada had dropped by a whooping 46 per cent, while they increased in the U.S., China, India and the United Kingdom.

However, when analysts with Clean Energy Canada took a deeper dive into the numbers for this latest report, they uncovered the decrease in investments was only 15 per cent when accounting for all clean energy projects, making 2015 the second biggest year for renewable energy investments in Canada.

Meantime, the country’s installed clean energy capacity grew by four per cent last year despite that drop in investment dollars, which the think tank concludes was likely due to policy uncertainty.

Smith noted that an increased price on carbon is needed to level the playing field.

“Right now fossil fuels are getting a free ride for their pollution,” Smith said. “Clean energy is the future. This train is going in one direction and that’s off of fossil fuels and onto clean energy.”

— With files from Emma Gilchrist.

Image: 1010/Flickr

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Clean energy advocates transformed one of Western Canada’s oldest oil derricks Monday by draping it with pro-solar banners and surrounding it with solar panels that powered sun-themed music.

“It was a really nice day here,” Greenpeace Canada energy and climate campaigner Melina Laboucan-Massimo told DeSmog Canada, “and so sunny.”

Despite the November chill, Laboucan-Massimo said the day was perfect for capturing solar energy. 

"Even though it’s chilly there’s still sun,” she said. “You actually increase efficiency for solar panels when it’s cold, because they don’t overheat. So when it’s cold it’s still fine to produce energy, as long as you have the sun.”

Laboucan-Massimo and the other campaigners are working to demystify solar energy in Alberta, a province with massive untapped solar potential.

“I think a part of what Greenpeace and other organizations and First Nations have been really successful at is pointing out the problem, but I think we need to start pointing to solutions and really articulating what those are and how to implement them,” she said.

People often point to wind and solar power as potential alternatives, without them actually coming to fruition. This is the case, “especially in Alberta,” Laboucan-Massimo added.

“What we’ve learned is that Alberta has one of the highest solar potentials across the country but utilizes only one per cent of that solar potential.”

Laboucan-Massimo stands with the oil derrick in the background. Photo by Greenpeace Canada.

According to the European Photovoltaic Industry Association, the world’s cumulative photovoltaic capacity has more than doubled each year for the last four years. Each year, new global solar installations prevent more than 53 million tons of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere.

However, the association notes solar energy in Canada “has expanded slower than some have expected.”

Laboucan-Massimo says the slow growth of solar in Canada, especially in Alberta, makes little sense.

“In Alberta, which is one of the sunniest provinces in the country, why is that happening?” she asks.

“We know it’s because of a lack of political will and because of a lack of policy that works to stymie renewable energy, and solar energy in Alberta.”

Alberta could and should be a green jobs and climate leader, Laboucan-Massimo said. But the reality is so far from that.

“We’re the number-one growing source of greenhouse gas emissions from tar sands as well as the number-one climate polluting province in the country because of tar sands.”

“I think that the fossil fuel industry has really had a stranglehold on the Alberta government,” she said.

That’s part of the reason Laboucan-Massimo and other solar advocates staged their solar action yesterday in Edmonton, a city with a long history of oil and gas development.

Laboucan-Massimo said is was in part to “really proclaim the power of the sun.”

“We know that solar energy and the solar viability is here and now.”

The team dropped several banners from a 70-year old oil derrick, reading “Solar: Alberta’s Next Economy” and “Solar: 100% Climate Safe.”

The group also set up solar panels on the site to power a radio and their phones. While they hung the banners they took music requests from the public using the hashtag #CatchUpAB.

“What we’re saying now is it’s time to transition away from dirty fossil fuels and transition to the renewable energy economy that is here and now,” Laboucan-Massimo said, adding Albertans are ready for economic alternatives.

“We look at Germany that has almost 400,000 jobs in the solar sector. Why doesn’t Alberta have that? We actually have a better solar potential than Germany and yet we don’t utilize that at all.”

Image Credit: Greenpeace Canada via Flickr

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This article originally appeared on the B.C. Sustainable Energy Association website.

It’s known as “the warm land,” and as soon as you get off the highway Vancouver Island’s Cowichan Valley certainly has the feeling of pleasant summer warmth, filled with agricultural fecundity. It was the Coast Salish Cowichan people who gave it the name – that’s what cowichan means in the Hul’q’umi’num language.

So solar energy lies deep in the heritage of the valley, and maybe its appropriate that British Columbia’s first solar bulk buy has sprung unto life here, and is pioneering a new approach to solar installations.

Peter Nix—who calls himself a Cowichan carbon-buster—started pondering the possibility in May, so he was ready to leap when the opportunity arose to place a bulk order for 720 solar panels, totaling 200 kilowatts. A large project had fallen through, and the panels were available at 72 cents a watt, much less than the market norm of $1.00 a watt for solar PV of this quality.

Peter is a biologist who used to work—for his sins—in the Alberta Tar Sands, helping Suncor reclaim its ravaged lands. When he submitted a mine-closure report laying out the many difficulties of achieving this goal, only to see it edited with the statement that “the reclamation of oil sands lands will succeed,” which he knew to be unprovable using science, Peter knew he could no longer be a team player, and it was time to quit.

Carbon-Busting

Since becoming a carbon-buster, driven by a passionate anger about the climate emergency and what it will mean for his children and grandchildren, Peter has been arrested when he and thirteen others stopped a coal train exporting U.S. coal through British Columbia; lobbied the U.S. Senate and Congress for a carbon fee and dividend in Washington D.C. with the Citizens Climate Lobby; organized a solar hot water bulk buy; and joined the People’s Climate March in New York in September.

With the promise of 720 cut-price solar panels, Peter got on the phone to his carbon-buster network and within a week 30 people had given him $125,000 in cheques. He had no formal organization, no treasurer, and no idea where he could even store the panels when they arrived, but he was working with good people.

The panels were ordered by the Viridian Energy Cooperative, a workers’ coop of five licensed plumbers, electricians and engineers based in the Cowichan Valley who offer a renewable energy design and consulting service, whose vision is “to contribute to a world where clean, renewable energy is the established method for powering energy efficient, environmentally friendly, healthy and resilient communities.”

Among the Coop’s members is Eric Smiley, who used to teach courses on solar energy at BCIT, who has coordinated and taught in Vancouver Island University’s Green Building and Renewable Energy Technology Diploma, and is among the best-informed people on solar in the province.

Mike Isbrucker, of Alternative Electric in Duncan B.C. has partnered with Viridian to coordinate many of the details and some of the installations. Mike also brings years of solar PV installation experience and contacts, rounding out the expertise and making this a truly cooperative venture.

The panels are top quality poly-crystalline, made in China by Canadian Solar, one of the world’s largest and most successful solar energy firms, with annual revenue closing in on $3-billion, built by the visionary Canadian engineer, Shawn Qu, starting in 2001. In 2013, the company manufactured almost 2 gigawatts of solar PV, enough to cover half a million homes with 4 kw systems.

$3.00 to $3.15 a Watt Installed Price

Eric has done the math for Peter’s bulk buy, and using a “reasonable case”, assuming a 5 per cent shading loss and an increase in BC Hydro rates continuing at 3 per cent a year after the announced 28 per cent price increase over the next five years, the installed price comes to $3.15 a watt, with some easier installs coming in at near $3.00. That’s quite a stunning reduction from the market average of $4 a watt, or $3.50 for a group of homeowners who contact a company at the same time seeking a coordinated install.

To put that in context, $4 a watt is a 100-fold drop in price since 1980. The “Solar Tsunami,” as I like to call it, is hitting the world in waves, and this may be the first sign that it is reaching B.C.’s shores.

Financially, when Eric Smiley crunched the numbers he calculated that members of the buyers’ club will see a long-term profit over 25 years of $3,650, giving an internal rate of return at 1.6 per cent, and an equivalent GIC rate of 2.0 per cent. The actual install costs are coming in cheaper than expected, however, so the financial returns are going to be higher. 

The panels arrive next week, and most of the 30 net-metered installs will be done by Viridian and Alternative Electric, averaging 3 kw per home, with a few being done by do-it-yourselfers. By November, we should start to see the photos pouring in from the proud solar owners.

A 50 kw Commercial-Scale Solar Farm

Peter has bigger plans, however. He is buying 200 of the panels himself to install a 50 kw commercial-scale solar farm in his own back yard, to create a focus where people can learn about solar energy and get inspired, and to make the business case for installing solar panels.

And that’s just the beginning. He and his group are exploring the options of setting up a permanent Solar Cooperative, or joining the existing Cowichan Energy Alternatives. Having helped produce North Cowichan’s award-winning Climate Action and Energy Plan, he wants to lobby the municipality to set up its own renewable energy utility, and to assist people to buy and install local renewable energy systems. And why stop there? He sees the whole of Vancouver Island as being full of solar opportunity.

To wind this up, last night I attended a community meeting on solar energy in the Yellow Point area east of Ladysmith, where I now live. The hall was packed with 85 people, all keen to learn about solar and the possibility to reduce their BC Hydro bills by producing their own power. For a very small rural community, this was a very big turnout.

Peter Nix presented his solar bulk buy ideas, a local installer talked about the importance of reducing energy demand before buying solar, and Dave Neads from Gabriola Island told us how their non-profit, GabEnergy, is assisting Gabriola residents to source, install and commission their own solar PV systems for an even lower price.

How low? To answer to this question, we’ll have to wait until I visit Dave on Gabriola, and dig into their work. Is on-the-ground community organizing like this the key to a solar breakthrough in British Columbia? If so, B.C.’s Solar Tsunami might be arriving a lot sooner than I thought it would.

So all credit to the Cowichan Solar Bulk-Buy group for their astonishing pioneering work!

Image Credit: Solar cells by 4D via Flickr

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Investing in wind, and solar power is not the main cause of rising costs of electrical bills in Ontario, as many in the province tend to believe. According to a study released last week, the cost of green energy – renewables, and bioenergy – is a mere 9% of an average household power bill in the province.

“As the new kid on the block, renewable energy is all too often blamed for rising electricity costs. The truth is renewables play a fairly small role in Ontarians’ electricity bills today,” said Gillian McEachern of Environmental Defence. “But they have significant health and environmental benefits that aren’t reflected in our monthly bills.”

The study conducted by Power Advisory LLC, an independent energy consultancy firm, found the costs for wind, solar, biomass and energy conservation was only $15 on an average monthly household power bill ($137) in Ontario. The costs of nuclear power and maintaining the electrical transmission network were found to be $37 and $46 respectively on an average bill. 

“Energy provided by the wind and the sun will always be free. The same can’t be said for other sources of energy,” reads the study titled Your Home Electricity Bill.

Coal power plants are estimated to have cost Ontario an estimated $4.4 billion in health care and environmental and financial impacts. Upgrading Ontario’s long neglected electricity delivery network over the last ten years and phasing the province off of coal-fired power plants account mostly for the price of power bills going up, concludes the report which was published by Environmental Defence.

The last coal plant in Ontario is scheduled to shut down this year. Ontario currently has cheaper electricity rates than provinces dependent on coal for most of their electrical needs such as Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia.

Average power bills in major North American cities.

Shifting from coal to renewables has cost the province money. Environmental Defence argues the cost would have been the same if not more had Ontario decided to make up for the electricity shortfall with nuclear or natural gas.

“The Ontario government estimates that new gas generation costs between $85-$296 per Megawatt hour (MWh) and new nuclear generation costs between $87-$143/MWh, while wind energy costs $115/MWh,” states the report. Wind produces most of Ontario’s non-hydro renewable energy.

Last December the government of Ontario released its long-term energy plan and predicted power bills will rise 42% by 2018. Environmental Defence believes one of the best ways to avoid this price hike is through energy conservation.

According to the report, “if Ontario households increase energy conservation and energy efficiency, Ontario bills in 10 years could ultimately return to current levels." The report cities estimates from the Ontario Power Authority that if Ontarians use 20% less electricity the price of power bill today would be the same in ten years. 

Average power bill in Ontario according to the "Your Home Electricity Bill" report.

Retrofitting houses, more stringent energy efficiency standards for household appliances, energy audits of homes and financial assistance for low-income households with their bills are the report’s recommendations for decreasing the cost of electricity and improving energy conservation in Ontario.

Comparing electrical bill prices with and without energy conservation measures. 

Ontario’s long-term energy plan calls for some investments in energy conservation and refurbishing nuclear power plants to keep power costs from jumping up even more. Critics argue this may not be effective. Nuclear projects in Ontario almost always run two and half times over budget.

The rising costs of electricity in Ontario has been pinned on renewable energy by the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario – the official opposition – and blamed for scaring away business and pinching the pockets of Ontarians. The Progressive Conservatives have vowed to scrap subsidies for renewables and Ontario’s Green Energy Act if they win the next election. Ontario could face its next election as early as this spring. 

Image Credit: Government of Ontario, Environmental Defence

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